


As Queer as Easy Company

by Servena



Series: As Queer as Easy Company [2]
Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: Bickering, Coffee, Gaydar, Gen, Homosexuality, M/M, Male Homosexuality, Minor Injuries, Outing, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-06
Updated: 2019-01-06
Packaged: 2019-10-05 13:13:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17325659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Servena/pseuds/Servena
Summary: “So, how do ya even know he’s like that?”





	As Queer as Easy Company

“So, how do ya even know he’s like that?” Bill asks Babe one morning as they’re sharing a foxhole to brew some coffee. The coffee hardly deserves the name, being little more than brown water with a minimum of taste and caffeine, and one of their helmets is functioning as a pot, but it’s better than drinking melted snow all day.

“Like what?” Babe asks while he tries to get the fire going without wasting too many matches, hissing as he burns his fingers on the first. He doesn’t need to ask who Bill is talking about – ever since their conversation a few days ago, Bill has been picking the topic back up occasionally, much to Babe’s dismay, though he figures it’s because there’s currently nothing more interesting going on than his love life and the occasional shelling from the Germans.

“Ya know”, Bill says and takes the matches out of his hand without a comment, “like you.”

“Oh”, Babe just says. He watches as Bill lights the fire on the first try, while sucking on his burnt finger. When Bill turns back around he shrugs. “I just know.”

Bill frowns at him. “Yeah, but how?” He squints at the line for a moment before leaning out of the foxhole to pack a few handfuls of fresh snow into the helmet and setting it on the small fire, adding a few sprinkles of instant coffee from his pack.

Babe sighs and leans back against the wall of the foxhole.  “I couldn’t tell ya. It’s just a feeling, when I look at somebody.”

Bill settles down next to him. “So what, ya can see it in their face?”

“Their face, the way they talk, the way they look at other people – it’s all of that together”, Babe says, waving his hands around to convey that it’s a kind of magic.

“Alright”, Bill says a bit dubiously. “So how fast do ya know?”

Babe turns his hand in front of his face, checking out his burnt finger. “Sometimes when I first meet someone. Sometimes it takes longer.”

“That’s some superpower.” Bill shakes his head. “So how long did it take for him?”

“A while”, Babe says vaguely. The skin on his index finger is red and sensitive to the touch and he pulls a face. It would be just like him to get a burn in subzero weather.

“Yeah, it’s not like he does a lot of talking, does he?” Bill grins and then leans forward to stir the coffee a bit.

When he turns back around to find Babe still staring at his finger, he sighs and fills one of their cups with snow to hold it in front of his face. “Ya gotta cool it, what are you, a 5 year old?”

Babe shows him his tongue, but accepts the cup anyway to put his finger into the snow. Maybe it’s not too late to pull some of the heat out, though heat in general is something Babe would rather hold on to. He’s pretty surprised he can even still feel the pain in his finger at all since every exposed part of his skin has been numb from the cold for days.

“So who else?” Bill asks as he sits back down again.

Babe looks up from the cup. “What?”

Bill gets that exasperated look on his face that he always wears when Babe’s been dropping the thread of a conversation. “You know, is there somebody else beside you and the Doc?”

Babe frowns. “Why do you wanna know?”

Bill rolls his eyes at him. “Cause I’m freezing my ass off in this shitty forest and my only other source of entertainment are the goddamn Krauts trying to blow my head off. But if ya run into an interesting book, let me know.”

Babe sets the cup of snow down in front of him because the cold is starting to seep through his uniform. “You sure you wanna know?”

“Yeah, sure.” When Babe still hesitates, he adds with a more serious tone: “Babe, ya know me. I ain’t ratting anybody out, alright?”

Babe gives him a firm look. “You can’t tell anyone else.”

Bill nods. “Alright.”

“Especially not Luz! He talks too much for his own good.”

“Alright!” Bill repeats. “Jesus, how would I bring that up anyway?”

“I don’t know, you’re bringing it up with me!”

“That’s different and you know it!”

“Alright.” Babe shifts his position and almost knocks his cup of snow over. Its content is already half-melted from the warmth of his hand, but the cold numbs the pain in his finger, so he decides to leave it in a little longer. “Webster”, he says after a moment of silence.

Bill tilts his head. “Okay, I can see that.”

“And Liebgott”, Babe continues.

“No way!” Bill turns to look at him. “Now you’re taking the piss out of me.”

Babe just shakes his head. “I’m really not.”

“Joe ain’t like that! Hell, I’ve seen him flirt with broads back in England, he was definitely into them.”

Babe shrugs. “Well, maybe he likes both.”

Bill looks at him. “Is that a thing?”

“I think so.” At Bill’s facial expression he adds: “Hey, it’s not like I know everything about these things, alright? Didn’t do Queer Theory 101 in college or something.”

“Did you even go to College?”

Babe decides to ignore that question, mostly because he did not, in fact, go to a college and neither did Bill.

Bill uses that time to turn the new information over in his head for a moment before the expression on his face changes. “Wait, does that mean –“

“Yeah.”

“Liebgott and Webster –“

Babe nods. “Uh-huh.”

Bill runs a hand over his face. “God, I will never be able to un-hear this.”

“You asked!”

“Yeah, and now I regret it. Jesus. Opposites really do attract, huh?”

“Looks like it.”

Bill sighs, shifting to get comfortable in a foxhole that isn’t nearly big enough for a man his size. “Anybody else? – No, I don’t want to know, don’t tell me. – Is there anybody else?”

Babe nods.

“Damn. How many?”

Babe begins to count in his head silently, using his fingers for help. Finally he says: “Eight that I know of in this company, including Battalion HQ.”

Bill groans. “Jesus. That’s one queer company. So much for Article 93.”

Babe moves his finger around in his cup. The cold is starting to creep up his arm, but it hardly matters when he’s feeling frozen to the core anyway. Though he assumes that if he loses a finger to frostbite like this, Gene is gonna kill him. “It’s not a problem as long as nobody bothers to actually write a report.”

“And Winters would never risk to lose a good man over something like this.” Bill takes a long look at Babe’s face. “Wait, is Winters – no, I don’t wanna know. I don’t wanna know!”

“Alright!”

Silence hangs between them for a minute, interrupted by Babe noticing the steam rising from their make-shift pot. “I think our coffee is evaporating.”

“What? Shit!” Bill jumps up and throws a look inside. “Alright, there’s enough left. Clear out that cup or you ain’t getting any coffee.”

“Coffee”, Babe mumbles, making quotes in the air with his right hand, but he still dumps the half-melted snow out of his cup and holds it out so Bill can fill it. Now that he’s no longer cooling it the pain in his finger is returning, and he puts it into his mouth again.

Bill fills his own cup as well, inhaling the scent deeply before nodding in the direction of Babe’s finger. “Need me to call a medic for that?”

Babe shoots him a glare. “Don’t you dare.”

“I bet he’d take really good care of you”, Bill says with a wide grin.

Babe shoves a bit of snow in his direction. “Shut up! Or I’m telling you the rest of the names.”

Bill just groans at that and Babe gets to enjoy his coffee in peace.


End file.
